


Twists of Fate

by herprinceofdarkness



Category: The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Future Fic, Other, Spoilers, so don't read if you haven't finished the book
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-13
Updated: 2014-11-13
Packaged: 2018-02-25 06:51:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2612321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/herprinceofdarkness/pseuds/herprinceofdarkness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A bedtime conversation between Liesel and her young daughter/</p>
            </blockquote>





	Twists of Fate

Brigitte had slowly learned how to see the sorrow past her weary, gray eyes. But Mama refused to talk about what had gotten her here, or how she had become such a tired soul. Not that she hadn’t asked. Brigitte had asked her many times throughout the years to tell her story. But Mama always refused.

 

Until one day she got lucky. She caught her mama in a particularly forthcoming mood. And she finally learned.

 

Mama sat gingerly on the bed next to her, a small smile across her features. Giving her young daughter’s forearm a little pat, she told her all about a boy and a train and the bitter cold of the snow. Brigitte listened as she explained her humble beginnings on a street named after heaven, a wooden spoon, and watery pea soup. How she would roll cigarettes with her papa and carry bags of laundry with her mama.

 

She described late nights in the basement learning to read and walking toward the sun on a rope of clouds. The feel of the fireplace while listening to Hans Hubermann’s accordion playing. The laughter from a snowman in her basement. The feathery hair of the Stand Over Man and her thirteen gifts to him.

 

Her mama told her all about the little boy with the bad ears, and the sting of her papa’s slap. She told her about the book thief and the mayor’s wife and the open window. She explained to her daughter as best she could about the Word Shaker and how his war grew and crushed the entire country. And finally, she described the warm taste of champagne on a summer’s day and why she has never touched it since.

 

As Mama’s story came to an end, her words still resonating in the thin, November air, Brigitte remained quiet for quite some time. She tried to mix the image she had of her mother with this new vision in her head of a strong, smart, vulnerable girl. The girl who inspired and persevered and survived despite everything to tell not just her own story, but to carry many others with her.

 

Perhaps it was because she was at the tender age where she was fascinated by simple romanticism, or because she naturally saw devastating beauty in the wake of tragedy, but Brigitte could not stop focusing on the little boy in the story. Her mother’s once best friend, her partner in crime.

 

Brigitte thought of them playing soccer together in the streets until past dusk and hopping fences to steal apples straight off the tree branches. She thought of the boy that ran like Jesse Owens and was covered in dirt. The boy who was continually pushed down, but always got back up again. The boy that waded into a freezing cold river for a book. The boy that held her mother on the street as she kicked and thrashed and cried and took it all as if they were presents. The boy that would, without fail, obnoxiously ask her for a kiss. Until one day he didn’t.

 

The kiss he didn’t get until he was being cradled by death up into the sky as tears tracked down her mother’s ruddy cheeks.

 

“Did you love him?” Brigitte questioned slowly, her head tilting upward to read her mother’s wayward expression. Mama’s forehead creased and her eyes grew slightly hazy, as if she were mentally travelling back to that broken street in Molching.

 

“Yes, very much,” she nodded to her daughter.

 

Hesitantly, she looked up to meet her mama’s gaze in innocent curiosity. “Do you think you would’ve married him?”

 

Mama’s lips pursed in thought, trying to word her answer as best she knew. Her lips finally quirked into a slight smile as she replied. “Perhaps, I don’t know. But that’s not really something to think about, yeah? You know I love your papa more than anything, right?”

 

Brigitte smiled and agreed, but as her mama ruffled her hair and walked out of her bedroom, she could all but imagine the shadow of a young boy walking with her and holding her hand, a perpetually cocky grin spread across his face.

 

She curiously wondered that maybe, perhaps if the fates had turned out differently, another girl would have existed in her place. One with hair the colour of lemons.


End file.
